Tom and Kristen's Great RV Adventure: August 25 - Sept. 2,m 2017 - South Dakota Part 3

South Dakota continues to impress, particularly with Custer State Park.

The 71,000 acre park (one of the largest in the country) is nestled between the rugged Black hills mountains and the Great Plains. This is another place Kris could have stayed and painted for a month.

We stayed at the park campground for 4 nights, which is one of the longest stays anywhere planned for this trip. We loved our site, at the end of the road in a camp with only 20 other sites.

There was so much to see and do here.

In 1874, Col. George Custer and his troops found gold, confirming rumors that “there’s gold in them thar hills”, triggering the Black Hills gold rush. Over lumbering and several large forest fires prompted Grover Cleveland to create the Black Hills Forest Reserve in 1897. In 1919, the State Legislature voted to transform the preserve into a state park. The popularity of the park grew in 1927, when President Calvin Coolidge made it his “Summer White House”, staying for 3 months.

This beautiful gracious building is the State Game Lodge which was built in 1920, burned down shortly thereafter, and re-built within 7 months. It is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

From elegant to down home … we took a Jeep Buffalo Safari, followed by a traditional Chuck Wagon Dinner. The tour was great (many buffalo sightings) and the Dinner was a hoot.

There are many other buildings that date to the 1930’s, built by the Civilian Conservation Corps.

The park is known for its free ranging bison herd, numbering about 1400 (more about Buffalo in a future post). Driving around looking for Buffalo took us through perfect examples of South Dakota’s rolling open plains.

We rode our bikes over to Badger Hole, home to South Dakota’s first Poet Laureate – Charles Badger Clark, named so in 1937.

He was widely published in his day and wrote largely cowboy poetry. Current

cowboy poets frequently pay tribute to “the master” (Badger). The house stands, essentially the way he left it, including a dozen pair of leather boots all lined up, paper in typewriter, a large library for such a cabin and even the 1940’s plastic curtains in the kitchen. He lived here for the last 30 years of his life until 1957, when he died at the age of 74. His most famous poem: A Cowboy’s Prayer. (https://www.poemhunter.com/poem/a-cowboy-s-prayer/)

Another treasure in Custer Park is Sylvan Lake.